


Freshman Year

by BoxWineConfessions



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: College, Hand Jobs, M/M, Oral Sex, Slice of Life, Snowballing, and have sex, but never talk about commitment, sort of established relationship, sort of slow burn, that thing that happens in college where you're inseparable
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-20
Updated: 2017-04-01
Packaged: 2018-09-01 01:20:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 20,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8601616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BoxWineConfessions/pseuds/BoxWineConfessions
Summary: “Night Leo,” he says when his head finally hits the pillow. It’s sublime, feeling full, and clean, and ready for bed. This doesn’t feel scary, could maybe with time feel like home someday. “Night, Ji,” his friend says back. He can’t see him in the darkness of the dorm room, but he can tell by the sound of his voice that Leo is smiling. “We’re gonna have a good year, yeah?” He says it more to ease what little bit of anxiety still lingers there. “Of course.”





	1. Chapter 1

“Ladies and gentleman, the Captain has tuned on the fasten seatbelt sign. As we prepare for landing, please ensure that your seatbelt is fastened and that your tray table is stowed away. The local time in Detroit is 11:35 P.M.”

When the flight attendant makes the announcement again in Chinese, Guang Hong’s eyes snap open as he scrambles for his shoes and his phone before buckling his seatbelt. He doesn’t exactly know what day it is or how long he’s been flying, but he knows that left at midnight the night before in Beijing.

He’s not even going to remove the fuzzy if not slightly silly fuzzy socks that were included in the sachet of things provided to him in the “second class” cabin. They were extra soft and his parents paid enough so he could fly comfortably. Why not enjoy them?

As he rubs the sleep from his eyes he discerns a few things. First, he really really needs to brush his teeth. Second, he’s starving. He can’t say that he liked anything they’d served for the inflight meal. Finally, he must’ve fallen asleep at the worst angle. There’s a dull ache on his neck halfway between his shoulder and his ears.

He rubs at the spot a few times gingerly trying to abate the pain. It’s no use. A few seconds of rub does nothing for the ache that’s had hours to settle in.

As soon as the plane’s wheels touch down, he’s got his phone turned on. He doesn’t care about international rates. He’ll need a cab, and he’ll need to take a few pictures of himself leaving the airport to demark his first day in America.

Immediately he’s inundated by texts from Leo. He can’t help but clasp his phone to his chest in excitement before he can fully read them.

He’s going to start the same college as Leo. They’re going to be on the same continent, no the same city for the next three years. They could see each other every day if they wanted!

That alone was enough to make chills run down his spine. His phone buzzed again and he actually took the time to look at his texts.

“Ji, change of plans, Josie left me off at a reasonable hour :D” 21:55

“Seriously Ji, don’t get a cab. I’m gonna come pick you up.” 23:00

“Did you fly air Asia? I’m trying to find a place to park.” 23:20

Guang Hong clasped his phone to his chest once more. Every ounce of dread, or fear, or worry is gone, even if it’s just for a moment. Somewhere, between grinning like an idiot and hugging his phone like an idiot, he manage to type out a response.

“Just touched down. See you soon.”  23:40

A very small part of his brain says he should go to the baggage carousel first, and then find Leo.

In the end, he blames his feet. He’s been cramped in an airplane seat for hours and he needs to walk around more, not stand at the carousel and wait. So he pushes past the baggage claim and into the lobby. As soon as he catches sight of Leo seated in-between two business men he can’t stop himself.

It’s been since Worlds last April. All the Skype and I Messages and tagged Instagram photos in the world that can compare to seeing him in person.

“Leo!”

The other man absentmindedly pulls an earbud out at the side of his name. He looks up, and then his eyes go wide. “Ji!”

Guang Hong doesn’t exactly consider himself a physically affectionate person. His parents weren’t the most physically affectionate people, and his coach was vocally averse to hugs. She preferred to grab his hands and squeeze them hard after a good performance. But Leo stands up, opens his arms, and he can’t help himself.

He leaps forward into them, shrugging off any fatigue he might’ve felt seconds before. “Leo,” he pulls away, only slightly to lock eyes with Leo.

Guang Hong is very much reminded of the last time they saw one another in Helsinki. Leo’s body was warm, and his lips were soft and sweet. They’d snuck out of the Gala and spent the night tucked up against each other in Leo’s room. Although they did little more than kiss, it was enough to make both of them forget that neither of them had medaled.  “Ah, it’s so good to be here.”

Guang Hong wonders if it would be alright to kiss Leo now.

They haven’t really talked about it since Worlds, and that was four months ago.

“Good to be off the plane too right?”

“So good,” he deflates slightly. The second wind that Leo’s presence provided was short lived. Leo didn’t lean into kiss him, and so he decided against initiating a kiss.  He also had gotten the limited kind of sleep that one gets when flying, even in a non-economy seat.

“Let’s get your bags,” Leo says with a smile. “You can sleep in the car if you want.”

Leo carries most of his things to the car despite his insistence that he can get them.

He doesn’t sleep in the car either, despite the fact that Leo turned down the steady hip hop beats he’d been playing on the sound system on the drive over. The gray upholstery feels infinitely better than the airplane seat, and the warm late summer air warmed his skin after hours of being subjected to the cold recirculated air. Still he doesn’t sleep. He can’t take his eyes off the lights of the buildings they pass. Even when they turn onto the highway towards a rural area, he can’t stop watching. He waits for a sign, or a billboard, or a light because he doesn’t want to miss anything.

In between, he sneaks furtive glances at Leo, because none of it feels real yet. Neither being here, nor the fact that he and Leo kissed all those months ago.

“Thank you for coming to get me,” he says finally. He is grateful. He doesn’t doubt his English when he’s with Leo or talking with other skaters who speak it as a second language. With strangers though, he’s less confidant, afraid that he will butcher some word or enunciation. In the back of his mind he knows he could’ve managed a cab, but this is so so much easier. “It seems like it’s out of your way though.” He knows for a fact the international airport is a good ninety minutes or so away from the airport.

“Seriously, Ji,” he turns just in time to catch another one of Leo’s big lovely smiles. He gets to see that all the time now. “It’s not a problem.  I had a hard enough time getting things sorted coming here from out of state, and I had my family to help. I wouldn’t want you to do it alone.”

On the drive, he makes Leo tell him everything about campus.

“So I think your room is on a different floor. Connie, that’s the RA, put up name tags on everyone’s door, and I haven’t seen one for you. Anyway, I live on the sixth floor. Down the hall are some girls on the rugby team.. Lots of athletes live in our dorm,” Leo explains.

“The upperclassmen girls on the rugby team have a house off of seventh. They throw the best parties.”

Guang Hong nods, although he assumes that Leo can’t see him. His eyes are glued to the road ahead. Guang Hong’s too tired to think about any of it too critically.

Eventually, Guang Hong catches notice of a sign, and his eyes go wide. “Are we here Leo?” He can’t mask the excitement in his voice even though there’s nothing to see in the pitch blackness of the night.

“Yeah,” he says as he turns off the highway. “This is campus.”

“I want to see the Spartan!” He exclaims.

He anticipated that Leo would say something like, “It will be there tomorrow.” Or, “aren’t you tired.” His coach or his parents would definitley say that. Instead, he chuckles and says, “Sparty?” Okay.”

Leo makes a turn, and then another one and then pulls the car over.

“Alright, here we are.”

He unbuckles his belt and almost trips out of the car. His legs are stiff from the flight and the drive. “I thought it would be cooler.” He says after a moment.

“What did you expect? It’s just a statue.”

He knows it’s rhetorical, but there’s a difficult question to answer. He’s dreamed of this moment since before Skate America last year when his coach pushed really hard for him to come train here in the U.S. with her.

Nevertheless, he’s had a lot of time to build things up and tear them down multiple times in his brain.

“I expect everything to be amazing,” he says with little afterthought.

Guang Hong feels a hand lightly touch his shoulder, “we can come back in the light. Maybe it will look better during the day.”

When they arrive at the dorm, Leo explains, “I don’t think you’ll be able to get the key to your room tonight. It’s still technically summer session and they don’t have someone at the desk all the time.”

Guang Hong blinks at him a few times blankly. He’s too tired to really discern what it is that Leo is saying.

 He’s spent what little energy he has left looking around the dorm lobby with wide eyes. There’s a piano, and a television, and a table tennis table, and lots and lots of couches.

There are paper banners that say “Welcome back,” but he’s never been here before. He’s quite alarmed at the idea of calling this place home. Home is the cream colored, somewhat sterile apartment that he shares with mom and dad.

“Stay in my room?” Leo asks.

That he can understand. It’s an easy question to answer.

Leo is a Sophomore this year, so he has a single room all to himself. It’s far too small, with the sparse furniture eating up almost all of the available space. Leo has a bed, a wardrobe, a small desk and a chair. Little else.

There’s a rough charcoal gray floor rug that covers the tan tile floor, and a television precariously balanced on top of the wardrobe. Dozens of pairs of brightly colored athletic shoes spill out of the wardrobe and onto the floor haphazardly. Guang Hong can also see several pairs of ice skates in the open wardrobe door. Several pairs of gloves join the shoes on the floor.

He notices that Leo’s guitar rests in the chair, and there are several printed versions of his most popular Instagram photos printed and framed on his desk.

One of them is definitely both of them on the Skate America podium.

It absolutely doesn’t make him blush at all.

“You can sleep in my bed,” Leo insists. “The sheets are clean enough. I just put them on a few days ago.”

“Leo no! I couldn’t.”

“It’s fine.” Leo moves to the closet and pulls a thin mat out of the closet. “I have these foam pads from when my cousin came out to visit last spring and stayed a few days.”

Guang Hong furrows his brow in frustration. He doesn’t want to put his friend out like that.

“Ji, seriously. It’s fine.”

“We could both probably fit.” Guang Hong claps his hand over his mouth as soon as the words spill out. So much for waiting to talk about it.

“Well you are really small,” Leo chuckles. “Okay.”

The next forty minutes or so are too much for Guang Hong. Overstimulating in a way that couldn’t compare to the Beijing Airport, or Detroit International, or standing on the podium at Skate America. “Ji, take a shower. Ji, have something to eat. Ji, get some rest.” It’s strange to have Leo doting on him. He could get used to it probably.

It’s strange to lay in Leo’s bed knowing that this is where he sleeps each night. The sheets smell like whatever kind of body wash Leo uses. He knows because he himself just bathed with it. He had to pitch his going through security, and had to borrow Leo’s.

“Night Leo,” he says when his head finally hits the pillow. It’s sublime, feeling full, and clean, and ready for bed. Leo is only inches away from him on the narrow mattress. He can feel his warmth, and his breath, and he’s too tired to feel nervous about sleeping next to his best friend. His best friend and his first kiss. This doesn’t feel scary, could maybe with time feel like home someday.

“Night, Ji,” his friend says back. He can’t see him in the darkness of the dorm room, but he can tell by the sound of his voice that Leo is smiling.

“We’re gonna have a good year, yeah?” He says it more to ease what little bit of anxiety still lingers there. The bit of anxiety that says that all of it was a dream, and he and Leo never kissed at all.

“Of course.”


	2. Chapter 2

_“Ji Ji where’d you go? I wanted to get breakfast.” 08:13_

_“To get my room key.” 08:17_

_“Where’s your room? I’ll bring your stuff over.” 08:18_

_“1017. You’re the best.” 08:20_

“It’s worse than I imagined Leo,” He sighs softly when Leo crosses the threshold into the door he’d left thrown open.

“What why?” Leo’s eyes drift upward. He sees Guang Hong sitting on the mattress of the top bunk with his legs hanging over the side. His eyes drift back downward and he notices the sheets and blankets balled up at the end of the lower bunk alongside a sea of pillows. “Oh,” his eyes shoot back up.

Guang Hong watches Leo effortlessly hop up onto the top mattress. Guang Hong can feel the mattress dip beside him and let his legs dangle off the edge too. “Fraid of heights?” He elbows Guang Hong gently. 

“So far up Leo.”

“Met your roommate yet?”

“No, I hope he’s not weird,” Guang Hong pouts. “At the very least, he needs to be shorter than me to justify bottom bunk.” 

He can feel Leo’s gaze rake up and down his form. It would feel weird, if he didn’t anticipate some teasing instead.

“I don’t think that’s possible.”

“Leo!” He shoves his friend and then hops down from the top bunk without using the frame to step down. “Let’s get breakfast. Then you can take me to the rink.”

* * *

 

The few days before the start of the semester slide by at a crawl. Josie’s given Leo time off, and so they use that time to buy things that Guang Hong needs for his room. He Guang Hong meets his roommate, a blonde boy named Michael from Nebraska. He’s a “third string,” football player.

Guang Hong doesn’t know what that means.

Most importantly of all, he and Leo practice together at the rink.

“You didn’t answer my question Ji.”

“Huh?” Leo’s word tug him back into reality as he tugs at the white lace of his skate. He very may well have not answered the question. It’s been almost three days since he’s been on the ice. It’s hard to concentrate right now when he can feel the little electric shocks of excitement all over his body. He’s always loved skating, but the past few days where everything is new and vibrant are overwhelming in a way that makes his head hurt and his chest tight. 

The ice is familiar and comforting, and it doesn’t even feel like quads are scary when he’s here with Leo.

That strange shock of excitement is amplified by the fact that he’s a little loopy from lack of sleep. He’d woken up at four that morning and stared at the ceiling until gray gold light crept up over the blinds and into the dorm room.

He wasn’t going to let the jetlag win though. He wants to do well when coach Zhao inevitably pushes him onto the ice while she’s fresh off the plane sleep deprived and cranky. He won’t give her the chance to think that he was slacking.

 I asked you what you thought of your roommate.” Leo pulls on one glove, “You responded by saying the food he gave you was offensive,” and the other glove goes on as he finishes his sentence. “It’s perfectly normal to not like mac and cheese, especially if it’s made with that gross instant stuff. Just because he likes it doesn’t make him a bad person.” 

“Debatable,” Guang Hong replies with a smile as he tugs his own gloves on. He looks at his pullover on the bench for a moment, and can’t decide if he wants to put it on. He’s still warm from the walk over to the ice rink, but if he leaves it here, he’ll get cold instantly. “He’s kind of um loud, like I don’t know if he talks louder because he thinks I don’t understand him, or just because he’s loud.” He opts to throw it on anyway. “I’d requested a Chinese roommate. You know, I’m self-conscious about my English.”

“Your English is fine.” Leo zips his phone into the chest pocket on his own pullover. “There aren’t that many Chinese athletes you know. And all the athletes live on the top few floors of Wonders Hall.

“I didn’t know that,” Guang Hong replies softly. It makes sense though, it’s more than just a nice coincidence that Leo lives right upstairs.  “He watches baseball all the time. Like the game, and the recap on ESPN. The television is always too loud.”

“Does he play baseball?” Leo asks with a chuckle as a follow-up to his last statement.

“No! He’s on the football team!”

Together they toddle away from the bench and onto the ice. As soon as the crisp air cooled by the ice touches his skin his mood lightens. He takes a moment to just skate simple laps and figure eights opposite of Leo for awhile.

This is Leo’s reserved time, and he’s lucky to be able to share the rink even if it’s just for bit. He tries to commit the numerous award banners for the hockey teams and skate clubs to memory. This is home now.

As his speed increases, the green arena seats blur together and for a moment, he imagines for a moment he’s in a forest.

Maybe he has enough time before Skate America to change his theme to something more exotic.

Nah, Zhao would never go for that. They’re a month and a half out from Skate America.

There’s an empty track of ice ahead of him, so he screws his eyes shut and goes into the quad Salchow he’s worked so hard to execute and incorporate into his routines the past few months.

When he opens his eyes again he’s shocked to find that he’s still on his feet. Somehow he landed it. He’s greeted with the sound of applause.

“Great job Ji!”

And a cry of, “Is that Ji?”

He looks over and he can see a short haired woman standing next to Leo, who’d paused his own laps. “Josie!?”

He skates over to the rail and immediately he’s embraced by Leo’s coach. “When did you get here Ji?”

“On Tuesday,” she smells like cloves and stale potpourri. She doesn’t wear makeup, except for the pale pink lip gloss that makes her mouth shine in the fluorescent light. Her smile is big and warm, almost as big and warm as Leo’s, but not quite.

“It’s good that you’re here.”

 "You’re just saying that because Zhao’s coming.”

The woman doesn’t let go of her embrace, but her face rebels against the warm gesture of the hug. Her brow furrows and her mouth tugs into a sneer. “You’re lucky you’re cute Ji,” she says through clenched teeth as she aggressively tousles his hair.

“I mean, she’s looking forward to seeing you,” he shoots back with a toothy grin that might get him clobbered.

“Uh, huh.”

“Careful Ji Ji,” Leo slides up beside them. “She packs a mean punch.”

“Josie would never Leo.” but he doesn’t miss the opportunity to fuel the fire a little more by ducking behind Leo and hiding behind him. “Now that she’s here, does that mean I get to see your new short program?”

“You’ve already seen it,” Leo’s face goes as red as his coach’s. 

“Not in person.” The videos, the snapchats, even if they weren’t shared on his private channels still paled in comparison to seeing Leo’s routine in person. Knowing that he planned each and every move carefully and poured his heart and soul into it while doing it...The feeling makes his heart beat fast. Maybe faster than waking up with Leo warm and nearby.

Maybe.

“You want to show him?” Josie asks but she’s already turned on her heel towards the sound control booth. 

“Yes please.”

Guang Hong glides off the rink and grabs a seat on the bleachers. Nervously, he wrings his hands against the hard wooden edge of the bench. It’s strange. He’s used to the electric feeling of nervousness that he gets before performing for others, but there was something about watching Leo that made his ears burn. Made him feel short of breath like he was skating.

Leo glided out to the middle of the rink.

A after a few moments, the slow chords of a piano fill the rink. They’re almost melancholy. It’s not like the kind of songs that Leo usually likes to skate to. He’s been meaning to ask about it every time Leo sends him a video, but he always gets distracted by Leo’s smile, and his smooth skin, and the liquid grace of his movements.

Leo goes into a simple step sequence as the lyrics begin. Leo always chooses songs with meaningful lyrics, and so he does his best to listen closely.

_In the middle of the night sometimes I wake up when you’re sleeping_

_And I think about the times that we ’ve been through_

_From the very beginning, you were here by my side_

From there he goes into a triple axel, and lands it perfectly. Of course he does. Leo’s strength is in program components. Immediately he goes into a camel spin.

_As we continue on this road_

_But stick together_

_They can keep us above_

A few lunges to build up momentum, and then…Guang Hong lets out an audible gasp. Was that a quad? That was totally a quad! He’s changed it since the last video.

It happens right as the chorus ends in a poignant crescendo.

_My love won’t end, I’ll always be right here by your side._

After that comes the combo. Would it be another quad? Guang Hong covers his mouth with his hand as he counts silently to himself. Three for each. Oh well. Who cares? Leo landed the quad, and that improvement alone will be enough to impress the judges at Skate America.

Leo goes into his final jump, a triple loop.

The final spin, and then the step routine, and Guang Hong can finally exhale. Before he thought that the song was different from what Leo usually picked, but he was wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Now that he’s had the chance to see it in person and really hear the lyrics he understands. It’s emotional and subdued at the same time. Very Leo.

He can’t help but skate out onto the ice to see him.

“A quad Leo!? That’s wonderful!”

“I couldn’t let you get too far ahead of me,” he says with a grin.

He wants to say something in response, but Josie’s appeared out of nowhere and she’s telling Leo all about the sloppy flying spin. “If you pull that in a competition you’ll be deducted.” He can see her point. Why increase difficulty if you’re just going to have deductions for poor execution immediately after…Still, how can she be so desensitized to seeing Leo do a quad!? Huh? How?

“Your turn now,” Josie says as she cocks her head toward him.

“Me!?” This shouldn’t be a surprise. Up until very recently, Josie had been critiquing his routines whenever they were on the same continent. Occasionally she gave unsolicited feedback whenever he sent Leo a video. He looked from Josie to Leo and back at Josie. Somehow this felt very, very wrong.

“Come on, it’s not like Zhao’s gonna get upset if you show us your routine.”

An argument builds in his throat and dies on his lips. Zhao is always needlessly secretive, but the desire to impress Leo is stronger than the paranoia that his coach will somehow find out.

He’s switching things up this year and doing a faster paced song for his free skate program. It may or may not be something that Phichit convinced him to do one night after a very, very long Skype session. The story is way more believable than inferno.

With a perfect loop and easy spin he becomes enveloped in the story…So much so that he can feel the sloppiness of his combo and the hard land. He bounces back with the axel, and intends to end strong, except.

He sees a familiar silhouette in his vision. Perfect jet black hair against a perfect crisp white blouse that makes the ice look blotched by comparison. He doesn’t need to see her face to know.

Zhao.

In that moment she’s not his caring, but undeniably strict and occasionally cold coach. She’s not the woman who squeezes his hand after every performance while they wait for scores, or the coach who buys him ice cream every so often after practice and says, “You’re young. Who cares? Eat what you want.” She’s every negative thing the skating blogs have said about her and more. The terror of Beijing. The devil on ice.

The fall is quick, and he manages to pick himself back up, but…Yeah, she saw that.

She speaks as soon as he finishes the short program. “Guang Hong,” her voice is colder than the ice that brushed his skin moments ago. “If I had known that these two would motivate you so much, I would’ve applied for this job years ago.”

He turns towards her voice and she’s standing there with Leo and Josie against the rail as if it were old times. Except Leo looks like he wants to bolt out of the arena with his skates still strapped on….If he did he might join.

“You’re here early. And, I messed up,” His tone comes off more as a question than a statement.

“But the feeling, the emotion. Very present,” she says it tersely, but the corner of her mouth is pulled into an awkward half smile. She did say part of his problems at the Cup of China had to do with emotion, didn’t she?

“Good Job.”

He locks eyes with Leo again. They both exhale.

“That,” Leo stabs at the ice in the bottom of his drink with a straw. The plastic cup lid makes an ear splitting squelching sound. “Could’ve gone worse.”

Guang Hong has both arms sprawled out across the picnic table outside of the dorm. His head rests in the crook of his elbow. After wrapping things up in the arena, “cool down,” had been a somewhat tense three mile jog with all four of them present.

“They shouldn’t have broken up if both of them were going to keep bossing us around,” Guang Hong decides finally. Although his own parents are married, he feels like this is what kids with divorced parents have to go through. The weird tension followed by uncertainty.

 “Maybe we should get them back together.” Leo wriggles his eyebrows playfully, like it’s something they could actually do.

In response, Guang Hong rakes his palm across the rough wood of the picnic table. His hand passes over at least five shallow inscriptions of couples initials either connected by, or encircled in a heart. Were any of them together now?

Probably not.

“She came for a reason right? Why else would she accept the job?”

She applied for the job for Josie. She accepted after the breakup because… “Because I wanted to come here.”  Things go silent between them for a moment. It’s rare that Leo doesn’t know what to say to him in response.  “It is frustrating though,” Guang Hong picks the conversation back up again, although he’s not exactly sure why. “They seem to still like each other. The pressure though….” It’s easier to be “out” in China than it was before, but it’s still hard when you’re in the public eye.

“I wouldn’t let the pressure get to me,” Leo says finally. He locks eyes with Guang Hong and holds his gaze. “If I found someone, I’d be committed no matter what. I wouldn’t let go no matter what.”

“Really?” Guang Hong can feel his heart rattling in his chest, as if they’d never stopped running and only kept going. They found each other, but they weren’t committed.

Guang Hong wants to elaborate on this little nagging feeling at the base of his neck. He wants to explain that people don’t just fall in love with the intention of things ending, but it’s easy to get swept away in the intensity and the fire in Leo’s eyes that look like the amber jewelry that Zhao wears to Galas on top of fine silk scarves. So instead he responds, “Me neither.”

He can feel his cheeks go hot as he tries not to think about Helsinki.

Leo rips the lid off of the cup of ice and plucks an ice cube from the cup. He lets the cube linger on his lips for a moment before popping it into his mouth and crunching loudly.

“I just want all the people around me to be happy always. You know?”

Of course he does. To derive your happiness from someone else’s own, it’s such a Leo thing to say and to do.  Guang Hong would never admit it, but he didn’t quite get it. Sure, he wanted to impress Zhao. He wanted to skate well to make his parents proud, to make China proud. He not so secretly lived for making Leo smile. But Leo was on a different level it seemed…

 “Hey,” Guang Hong finally breaks the silence that hung between them. “Do you have that song from your short program on your phone?”

Leo nods.

“Can I listen to it again?”

Wordlessly Leo gets up from the bench and moves to the other side of the table. He offers Guang Hong a single earbud and moves closer to him on the bench. “You liked it?”

Their knees touch, and in the afternoon summer heat, Leo’s presence is almost too much. The touch of his skin sears against his own. Not to mention he probably smells awful right now and needs a shower desperately. He doesn’t dare pull away though. Leo’s like a magnet that he can’t help be drawn too.

The soft piano melody begins and at that exact moment a soft breeze ticks up. Makes Leo’s hair fly up into Guang Hong’s face. He brushes it back towards Leo’s face softly.

“Sorry,”

“It’s nothing…How  did you come to pick this song?” Leo’s music always has so much more personal significance than his own. He picks what he likes, but he doesn’t have a particular reason for why he likes something. He either does or he doesn’t. Leo could write mini-essays on why he liked something.

Leo stays quiet and tap his fingers along with the melody until the chorus hits. “I didn’t expect to skate at China last year you know.  I got lucky. I heard this song and I thought of all the love I’ve had around me. My parents, my siblings, Josie...you.” Leo elbows him lightly.

“Leo, stop it.” He elbows back. He can feel the flush rise in his cheeks. Leo’s always been more open about his feelings, whether they be feelings of joy or discontent or affection. He’s not sure if it’s an American thing or a Leo thing. The only other American he really knows is Josie, and she’s pretty open too.

But it begs the question, should he bring up Worlds? Should he mention hands under hoodies. Kisses that had too much tongue and too much teeth, and were addictive all the same?

“Sorry, talking about Josie and Zhao got me feeling nostalgic. Cramped hotel rooms before Skate America. Zhao snoring, you star fishing across the bed, Josie talking in her sleep. It’s a miracle I medaled at all last year.”

“It’s okay if I starfish, you spoon.”  The chorus of the song ends and they focus on listening again.

_Looking through these photographs of us. How much we've grown together_

It is a very nostalgic song, but Leo’s leaving out all the good details. There was dinner the night before, where their coaches would let them eat whatever they wanted, and Zhao would get one drink drunk. At night, the sound of each other’s breathing would be deafening when they couldn’t go to sleep and knew that the other was still awake.

There was always laying in bed all day after the free skate waiting for their red eye flights back home. So tired and unable to move, they’d sprawl out in separate beds while Josie and Zhao would go shopping. They’d pull the blankets up over their heads, and so they didn’t have to pull them back down again, they’d send text messages to each and giggle underneath the covers until Josie would come back, call them dorks, and drag them back out to dinner. 

“Remember Helsinki?” Guang Hong opts to keep it vague. Leo is an open person. If he wants to go further, he certainly will.

“Yeah,” Leo leans in closer and licks his lips as if he’d been waiting for it to be brought up. “How could I forget?”

And just like that Leo closes the distance between them. Leo’s mouth is cold and Leo’s lower lip catches between his. It makes Guang Hong breathe into the kiss.

This is everything that Guang Hong has wanted to happen since he cleared customs, but it doesn’t stop the fast and panicked voice in the back of his mind from asking _what if my lips are chapped_ and _what if my breath is bad_ and  _I want to French kiss him again because that was so nice when we tried, but I don’t want to knock teeth._

“Ji,” Leo breathes against his mouth when they part. Leo’s eyes flutter open.

“What took you so long?”

“Me?” Leo nudges him with his knee, but grabs him by the face and pulls him in for another kiss. With open mouths, they experimentally allow the kiss to deepen with little preamble. “Neither of us brought it up Ji.”  Leo’s voice is soft, nonjudgmental, and there’s a tinge of something else there too. Wistfulness? Regret? It can’t be regret, he’s only been here for a few days.

“Oh well, Leo.” Guang Hong struggles for the right words. His brain flashes words, but in the heat of the moment he can’t remember exactly how to say them in English. “Um, I like you. So let’s keep doing it.”

This time Guang Hong closes the distance between them. He kisses faster than Leo. Opens and closes the kisses so that Leo’s leaning in for more. 

“Doing it?” Guang Hong can _feel_ Leo smirk against the shell of his ear and it makes his whole body flush pink.

“Leo!” Guang Hong slaps the other boy’s shoulder.

* * *

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've retooled this fucker and I'm determined to make progress. If you've followed this fic from the beginning, maybe give a passing glance over to Ch 1 & 2 again. I've changed the structure of the fic a little bit. 
> 
> TRYING TO BUILD CHARACTERS HERE LOL WHAT THE SHIT.

Leo was popular.

Guang Hong was aware of this. Leo was always flanked by someone when they met up for Grand Prix events, or Four Continents, or Worlds. Phichit often came along with them to get dinner or go sight seeing and take selfies. Sometimes Leo would be accompanied by Miranda and Josh, the ice dancing pair that dominated the American scene, and of course there was Lucy. A girl in juniors who trained at Leo’s old home rink in Colorado.

Those two were quite close, and whenever they were together for competition, Guang Hong found it difficult to get in a word edgewise.

Needless to say, Guang Hong is used to Leo being around people. During skating events it’s expected. Guang Hong is quite used to the strange tightness in his chest that arises when he tries to get enough time with Leo, and Phichit, and focus on medaling. He feels pulled in every direction, and so happy and exhausted by the time he’s on a plane back home.

Guang Hong didn’t quite understand the sheer magnitude of Leo’s popularity until the semester started properly. On campus, Leo’s warm personality and positive attitude only amplified his popularity. Leo knew everyone. They couldn’t get dinner without multiple invitations to sit down and eat. On the bus, one or two people would always stop and say hello.

Which seemed so strange given there were tens of thousands of students at this university. It seems like every moment is a grab for Leo and his warmth and his smile.

The sad part is, right now he’s not even trying.

“Leo I’m lost.” Guang Hong whispers into the receiver. He looks from one limestone building to another trying to differentiate between the two. It’s useless. The facades on the building are all near identical, and he’s not exactly sure where one row ends and the _other_ row, the ones which face third street and wind over to the recreation center begins.

He legitimately does not know where he is right now. The feeling makes his stomach churn, and makes him think of all of those days in primary school where he’d be teased for never knowing the correct answers to the teacher’s questions.

“Ji,” There’s a muffled crumpling sound into the receiver. “It’s the third week of classes.”

“Leo! Help me,” Guang Hong whines into the phone. He can feel the warm creep of embarrassment start at his collar bones and rise up to his ears. Guang Hong has had a lifetime to understand what it means to be talented as a dancer and as a skater, but it’s still difficult for him to reconcile the fact that this talent may come at the expense of other areas: such as a keen sense of direction.

“Where are you?”

“Uhm,” he steals furtive glances of the buildings nearby. “Near Morrison Hall?”

“Okay, I’m already in the recreation building because of my morning class. I’ll be over in a second.”

“All the buildings look the same,” Guang Hong explains when Leo finds him.

“Yeah, but,” Leo’s hand slips into Guang Hong’s. His fingers are inexplicably cold given the warmth of the afternoon which indicates that their conditioner is on full blast in the studio. His fingers squeeze tight with explanation, “you’re a dancer. Doesn’t your body just kind of know after doing something so many times which way to go?”

“Leo,” Leo opens the door to one of the many near identical limestone buildings, and Guang Hong _tries_ to differentiate this one from the rest. There’s a red brick building on either side, which is different as most of the buildings are limestone. He’ll try to remember that next time.  “This is different. Cause like,” he fumbles over the syllables that he wants to say. He could say them just right in Chinese, but English….”I care about dancing.”

“You have to care about how to _get_ to class then.” Leo’s voice is soft, and not judgmental. For that Guang Hong is grateful.

Then, as soon as they turned down the hallway and into the studio, as abruptly as Leo grabbed his hand, he disentangled their fingers.

Leo’s attention was always elsewhere during this class, _which_ Guang Hong would like to add he _only_ took because Leo suggested it when he learned he had a free elective.

“Leo!” a pair of twin voices chime when they enter the studio. They’re twenty or so minutes early for class, and have free reign of the studio until the instructor arrives. “Pick a song for us to warm up to,” followed by a bell like chorus of giggles.

This often means that Leo and the girls in the class put on their favorite songs and string together little bits of choreography in between leaning against one another and laughing.

Tiffany had big hair, soft brown freckles, and liked to wear warm up clothes in shades of bright yellow, and pink, and orange which contrasted nicely with her complexion. Andy had a short bob that reminded him of the rare photos he’s seen of coach Zhao when she was younger. She has crooked teeth, and a strange kind of forced smile that she uses to hide it.

Guang Hong wishes he was forward enough to tell her that she should just smile the way her happiness wants her to.

“Cause it’s Tiff’s turn, and she’s just gonna make us listen to the same three Drake songs she had us warm up to all last semester.”

“Not true!” but the other girl breaks eye contact with Leo, as if she was in fact going to make them listen to the same songs.

“Right,” Leo goes and plugs in his phone. “Let’s see what I can do. Let’s see if I have anything that our professor won’t hate.”

Leo falls into the music and moves without even so much as thinking about it. His movements are that right combination of fluid quick that rapid fire flip over into viscous slowed down movements that emphasize the rhythm and the flow of the beat.

Guang Hong still feels rigid going through the motions, even after the first few weeks of class.

“Nah, nah, nah like this Leo. You still think you’re on skates.”

Andy jumps in front of Leo and watches herself move in the long mirror that goes against the front studio wall.

“I do not. It’s called style,” as if to prove a point, Leo slides to the side, and mimics Andy’s low bent knee position, but morphs it so that it becomes his own.

This kind of playful taunting energy between Leo and the girls only continues throughout class. Leo will add in additional steps that the professor hasn’t approved of into the routine, and will try to see if the girls can catch on before the synchronicity is ruined.

It usually ends with the professor cutting the musing and admonishing Leo, the girls, and Guang Hong who never participates, but is always nearby and is assumed guilty by association.

Leo’s popularity is only exacerbated when they go back to the dorm.

Leo will often tire of his homework and wander through the hallways until he finds a vaguely familiar face to chat with. This is all well and good when Leo finds his way up to the tenth floor and flings himself onto the fuchsia bean bag chair that Guang Hong bought when Leo took him to the store, and asks his roommate Michael if they can borrow the Nintendo 64 he brought from home.

It’s not so great when Leo goes wandering around and _doesn’t_ end up in Guang Hong’s room. This of course, is quite often. Guang Hong has gone out to get ice cream at the dorm next door, and come back in the south doors only to find Leo sitting in the common room watching MTV with most of the hockey team, or Alex, his RA’s room speaking Spanish and laughing together softly. The strangest of course of these incidents was when he saw Leo walking out of the girls’ side of the floor mid-afternoon with sponge curlers in his hair.

“They wanted to try it out before their sorority formal,” Leo explains looking upward at the curlers that pull his scalp and hair tight, as if that actually explained anything at all.

All of this would be fine, Guang Hong would like to note, if Leo made any time for him and just for him at all. Their hands seem to always come unclasped whenever people are nearby. The soft and needy kisses that Leo gives only seem to come at night, on the occasion that he’s invited Guang Hong to stay and they sleep side to side on Leo’s narrow mattress.

Guang Hong wants to go on a date. An actual proper date that’s just him and Leo and no one else. Nothing fancy either. They could go to the mall and look at the pastel colored leggings in shop windows. They could stroll through the campus art museum and look at the paintings while listening to Leo’s favorite songs through shared earbuds. They could spread a blanket out in the grass and do their course readings under the sun.

Correction. They’ve tried most of those things during the few short weeks of the semester. But Leo always invites someone else along. Or someone that Leo knows wanders over and attaches themselves, and Leo doesn’t make the effort to make it known that they’re on a date.

Even on the weekends, the plans that Leo makes for them seem to always involve a cluster of other people.

“So you coming?”

“Uhm,” Guang Hong bites into the dumpling he’d had perched between his chopsticks for quite some time, and tries to control his expression. Leo had said that this little dirty hole in the wall a few blocks away from their dorm was “the best” Chinese restaurant near campus, and probably this side of Detroit.

It’s woefully under seasoned and a little greasy. Guang Hong is not impressed, but Leo doesn’t need to know that. He seemed so happy to bring him here.

“The girls throw really good parties trust me.”

“Well,” Guang Hong stares at the black and white checkered floor of the restaurant. His eyes then dart back to the rust red walls that are dotted with framed photos of places that look like Nanjing. He furrows his eyebrows. “I guess-”

“Perfect, so I’ll pick you up at eight, and we can get dinner. Then we can meet Alex and Emily, and walk over to the house.”

Guang Hong pulls his mouth into a tight pinch. The dumplings were almost forgivable. The fact that he and Leo never had a moment alone, not so much. It didn’t seem to matter where or when, Leo was always flanked by someone else. The rugby girls with their brightly colored head bands in the morning before their run, the rowing girls at breakfast, even now.

Leo strode into his room and asked if he wanted to go to lunch. Then, he cheerfully asked his roommate Michael, “you wanna come too man?”

Michael is objectively a nice person. If mom, or Zhao knew how he treated his own roommate, they’d scold him. Tell him to be nice. Zhao would say that she raised him better while simultaneously being cold. She was good like that.

Sure, he he had a big toothy American grin that devoured his face and made his blue eyes somehow seem bigger and more displaced on his face. Sure, he watched sports on television at an obscenely high volume.  He rarely did his dishes and let them grow moldy. He listened to rap music on his phone without headphones, but there were positives too.

His mother was very distraught that he’d moved away for college, and sent him large packages of homemade cookies, and candy, and chocolate. All of which he was _not_ supposed to eat during the season. Guang Hong was happy to help with what was offered.

Michael was also gone for away games, which meant that this weekend he’d have the whole dorm room to himself. Well, himself and Leo.

In addition to tagging along on what should’ve been a nice quiet lunch with just him and Leo, Michael ordered Crab Rangoon and offered some to Guang Hong. Guang Hong was suspicious given the macaroni incident a few days before. However, Guang Hong was petty, but he wasn’t openly rude. So he accepted, and he had to choke down the offending morsel _and_ hide his burgeoning disgust. 

Seriously!? Whatever that was, it was an offense to all five of his senses.

Because in addition to his roommate trying to poison him, Leo was also ruining his weekend plans.

Granted, he hadn’t actually _told_ Leo about those plans.  Instead, he’s upset that his plans, ones that he hadn’t asked Leo to actually participate in, had been interrupted. His roommate was traveling for football that weekend, and so he had the room all to himself. Why couldn’t they snuggle together on the top bunk and watch movies under Guang Hong’s brand new hot pink comforter? Why couldn’t they just get a pizza with an extra order of bread sticks and not tell Josie and Zhao about it the next day at practice?

“Dude,” Michael says in between wolfish bites of a sweet and sour dish. “You’re cool with the rugby girls upstairs?”

“Yeah, I know Alex from-”

“Leo knows everyone,” Guang Hong interrupts. “Especially all the girls on the rugby team.”

“Even the really tall one? The one that wears a bright pink headband looks like she’s about to murder someone?” Michael gets a faraway look in his eyes. The same one that he gets when he talks about his ex-girlfriend. The story goes that she got into a private school on the east coast and hasn’t spoken to him since she got her admission letter. It’s the same kind of look that he gets when he talks about the TA for their section of finite mathematics. She’s got the same kind of tall build with wide set shoulders and a murderous glare that most of the rugby girls seem to have.

So Michael has a type.

“You mean Grace?”

“Uh-yeah, Grace.” Michael nods, dumbfounded. “Aw, man I’m so upset I’m missing it.”

“Next time, man. I’ll introduce you,” Leo says with a smile.

Guang Hong bites his lower lip and tries his hardest not to ignore the little pangs of jealousy, and bitterness that churn in his stomach alongside the questionable food.

* * *

Grace, despite her big murderous stare, and her big muscular arms, and her big strong hand that claps too firmly on her shoulder, and her big voluminous breasts that make her low cut neckline beg for mercy, is a goddess.

Scary, but a goddess who somehow manages to make this whole party awful.

Because she’s the only person here that he _kind of_ knows that he’s seen for the better part of an hour. He’d been sitting on the couch wedged between Leo and Alex sending messages to Phichit, and then before he knew what was going on the familiar faces were replaced with strangers.

Guang Hong moved from room to room looking for Leo, or one of the girls he vaguely knew through Leo. He bumped into Grace in the kitchen.

“Ji,” she pulls him aside on his way out to the back porch. “Have some, I’m not supposed to have so much sugar,” and passes him a half empty bottle of electric blue colored liquid. Grace is leaning back onto the counter. Her long brown black hair seems to stick out in every direction once it’s been set free from the bright pink headband.

“You’re drunk Gracie,” Guang Hong responds without really thinking about it.

“Well,” she leans into him and breaks her whisper to giggle loudly into his ear, “I already had like, a whole bottle.”

“Oh,” at first Guang Hong believes that is quite a bit of alcohol. Then he remembers seeing Yuuri Katsuki, who is about her height polish off two bottles of wine at the gala. Viktor Nikiforov had just as much, if not more.

Guang Hong takes a half step back away from the counter that’s full of Grace, and dishes that were washed and left out in the rack to dry, and several disassembled kitchen appliances. Carefully, he raises the glass bottle to his lips. He’s never really liked alcohol before. His dad offered him some wine when he got his college admission letter, Zhao let him take a sip of her scotch on the rocks after worlds so that she could watch him grimace and laugh.

_This_ was actually good. The label said wine, but Guang Hong wasn’t convinced. There was no fruit on earth that made such a god awful shade of neon light blue.

“Are you going outside?” Grace threads her fingers through her long black hair.

He nods. “Let’s go.”

Guang Hong turns on his heel and walks toward the door. He feels the a sharp swat on his left butt cheek and it makes him jump almost to the ceiling. Makes him fumble for the bottle in an attempt not to drop it. “Let’s go watch _Leoooo,”_ she says it with a wink and a grin as if she knows something he doesn’t. “Play.”

Outside the night air is still and hot. It seems to be a constant around here. Stuffiness, and humidity, and nothing but heat. A strange cacophony of noises play across the yard. There’s the low roll of chatter from groups standing near the door, mostly athletes who are in season. They have practice in the morning, and want to avoid doing anything that will get them scolded by their coaches.

Further out in the yard, there’s the sharp yet jumbled noises of people who have been drinking for quite some time. There’s the up and down up and down sound of yelling that melts into too close whispers. Stories that reach their climax with a shout and an exaggerated movement. Towards the center of the yard there is a small fire in a raised metal ring. There are a few plastic chairs that were bleached light from the sun, and moldy all at the same time scattered in a circle.

Of course these too are filled with people. Drunk girls that are slumped over, and Guang Hong wants to ask if they’re okay, if they need to go in. Couples precariously slotted into the same chair, and not seeming to care about how the crumbling furniture seems to sag with their weight. In the center of course is Leo.

Of course Leo’s giving that half lidded lazy gaze that he always has when he’s doing something he likes. One that says that he is at ease, and nothing is out of place. Leo picks and Leo strums, and his hands move up and down the neck of the guitar.

There are several pairs of eyes on him, but Leo does it all like nobody's watching.

Guang Hong wishes that he could be like Leo, and just _exist_ without worrying about what other people thought.  He moves effortlessly in the front row of dance class. He moves through his step sequence with ease, even when the rink is packed.

In theory, Guang Hong knows that he can dance, and can skate, but it doesn’t abate the pink hot blush that blossoms in his chest and creeps up past his ears whenever he does something in front of the watchful eye of others.

He wishes he could sit right next to Leo while he strums, but he can’t. The chairs directly next to him are occupied by Alex and Emily, who stare blankly at their phones. Their faces are washed greenish blue with the light.

He doesn’t blame them. He’s spent a decent chunk of the night on his phone. Absent mindedly, Guang Hong raises the bottle to his mouth once more. The liquid is still addictively sweet, like the blue hard candies that Michael's mom sends in big bags, but in drink form.

“Let’s just,” Grace tugs firmly on his hand. “Sit,” and before he can steady himself he’s being pulled downward into the grass. It’s long and overgrown, and he’s almost certain that he’ll have red marks on his legs later from sitting in it.

“Gracie,” but Guang Hong doesn’t mind. From here he can just watch.

Leo ends the song just as Guang Hong screeches “Gracie.” Their eyes meet for just a moment, and Leo flashes him a smile. It’s the kind of wide smile that pushes his half-lided gaze fully closed. His hands wander up and down the neck and play several notes up and down in rapid succession.

Then, he rocks upward and pauses. Gets up from the seat and walks over toward where Guang Hong sits in the grass, where Gracie has unceremoniously dumped her impossibly tall frame out on the lawn.  

Leo’s voice is soft and smooth like when he speaks. “So tight. So fly.” It’s strange, how Leo can be so absorbed in everything and everyone else all night, and then zero in on him and just him just like that.

“Ohhhhhhh Leo,” Alex perks up and looks up over her phone. And teases, “Get it.”

Guang Hong’s mouth goes dry, so he takes a long draught of the blue stuff to quench his immense thirst.

It’s strange, how Leo can not care that others are watching, and somehow shift the spotlight to him. He’s done it on the podium too, by pulling him close for press photos and running into the kiss and cry to meet him after a performance.

“Got me lifted shifted higher than a ceilin’', and it's the ultimate feelin.'” Leo’s hand abandons the the guitar for a moment, and he plucks the bottle from Guang Hong’s grasp and takes a sip. Carefully he replaces the bottle and continues to play. “Sugar how you get so fly?”

It’s so strange how Leo will let go of his hand before they walk into class together, and wait until he has to beg to kiss him, and pretend like so much as _nothing_ has happened between them, but will sing a song to him and make it feel like he’s looking at only him and singing to only him and exists at this point in time with only him.

“Suga suga.” Leo’s voice finally cracks and he interrupts his own playing. “Something like that. Right Ji?”

He sinks down onto the grass next to Guang Hong. “Okay over there Gracie?”

The other girl has given a thumbs up over the screen of her own phone. “Just taking some _tipsy_ snaps,” she explains in a voice that’s elongated to the point of exaggeration.

“Having a good time?” Leo leans into Guang Hong so that his voice is almost a whisper. It makes the hair stand up on the back of his neck. Makes him feel warmer than the stagnant September air, or the thick sugar sweet of the wine he’d been drinking.

“It’s okay,” Guang Hong confesses. Leo’s fleeting attention doesn’t compare with spending the night crushed together underneath the covers, but if he’s got Leo’s attention, he’ll take it.  “It’s nice hearing you sing,” and that’s the truth. Leo’s voice is soothing, even when he’s trying to be cool.

“Really,” Leo tucks his hair behind his ears, and steals another swig of the drink. “Careful with that Ji, it’ll sneak up on you.” Leo reaches for the guitar once more. “Let’s see what else you’d like.”

It doesn’t matter, Leo could sing him the alphabet song and he’d probably stare on with rapt fascination.  

“Oh,” Leo plays a few rapid and repetitive chords, “ Baby you light up my world like nobody else.

The way that you flip your hair gets me overwhelmed.”

_Oh._ If his face wasn’t red before, it is now. Guang Hong knows this song.

“That’s what makes you beautiful.”

* * *

“Careful with that Ji, it’ll sneak up on you,” Leo tried to warn him out of personal experience. He’s hung out with Grace while she’s been drinking before, and he’s been handed strong mixtures of sugar and alcohol that tasted like candy and left him struggling to hide his headache at practice the next day.

But Guang Hong is impossibly stubborn. Guang Hong practices jumps until his feet are bleeding and Zhao’s barking at him to stop. Guang Hong makes split second decisions about people based on first impressions, and decides whether he likes them or not. It’s why he and Guang Hong get along despite being so different, and why Guang Hong feels so inexplicably uncomfortable around Seung-Gil Lee.

Guang Hong  decides what kinds of foods he likes best, and doesn’t try anything else until Leo places a tiny bit of his own dish onto Guang Hong’s plate. This only works if he doesn’t say a word about it. If Ji likes it, then he cannot, under any circumstances point out that he tried something new and liked it.  

Clearly, Guang Hong has decided that he very much likes the sugary malt liquor that Grace gave him. He drains the bottle after a few more songs.

For a moment, Leo thought that perhaps it was possible that Guang Hong could imbibe without consequence. The wine had a relatively low alcoholic content, and they’d eaten dinner before going to the party. However, as the evening meandered onward, it became clear that Ji was, somewhat affected.

Ji’s fair and freckled skin, which was often tinged pink with a slight blush, turned almost dark cherry red across his cheeks and across his collar bones. Leo would’ve missed it in the dim outdoor lighting, but the glow of Ji’s phone against his skin made it apparently clear.

Then of course, there’s the way that Ji slowly sinks down into the grass. Before long he’s spread out on his back on the grass, and mirroring Grace’s drunken position. “Don’t do that,” Leo chides. “You’ll get grass all over. Lean against me instead.”  He tugs at Guang Hong’s shirt, making him sit up. He puts his guitar to the side, and accepts Guang Hong leaning into him. Leo spreads his legs wide, and lets Ji sit between them so that he’s propped up against Leo’s chest.

“S’ nice Leo.”

Leo pushes Guang Hong’s hair out of his face. His body is warm and heavy against his chest, and it makes his heart beat faster than running through his free skate and his short program concurrently. Makes him feel that strange mixture of excitement and fear that happens whenever he moves to the edge of his blades and flows into a quad.

Leo lets his hand drag down slowly from Ji’s earlobe, down his neck, to his high angular collar bones.

“How come,” _hic_ Ji interrupts himself with a sharp little hiccupping noise. “You ignore me all night, and then,” _hic_ , “sing to me?”  

“What do you mean?” Leo’s hand stops so that it rests just below Guang Hong’s collar bones so that he’s gently cupping Ji’s chest. The rise and fall of his chest is slow, steady, constant, and mesmerizing.  Leo very much wants to trail his fingers back and forth over the ridge of the collar of Ji’s shirt and the exposed skin on his chest just to feel the contrast between silken skin and fabric.

Guang Hong sits up so that he can turn to face Leo. He subjects him to that critical honey brown gaze that indicates that he’s done something very wrong. Leo considers the events of the past few days. Guang Hong has woken up crammed in his bed more days than he’s spent in his own lofted bunk. They take most of their meals together, and go to the rink together as well.

“Sometimes it feels like you have your feet in two boats,” and that’s how Leo _really_ knows that Guang Hong isn’t quite himself. Ji is super self-conscious about his accent, about saying things correctly in English, and not borrowing his mother’s strange countryside phrases, analogies, and euphemisms.

However, as soon as the strange phrase rolls off his tongue, Guang Hong’s sour expression melts into a warm grin. He giggles slightly and leans in close to Leo’s space.

At the very least Ji’s a happy drunk.

“Everyone knows I’m here with you, Ji. Isn’t that enough?”

“No.” Ji’s lips are sticky with sugar. He tastes like the artificial and chemical laden drink, but somehow sweeter. The swipes of Ji’s tongue across his lips and his mouth are whisper soft, as if he’d used up all of his directness in finding the energy to lean into the kiss in the first place. Ji moans into the kiss and slumps back into Leo’s arms.  It makes Leo want to laugh. If anyone at the party _didn’t_ know they were together before, they certainly did now.

When they part, there’s a thin string of saliva that connects his lips to Ji’s. It’s the kind of thing that you see in the movies, and it _should_ be gross in real life. However, Leo is captivated and cannot look away.

“Leo,” Ji’s voice is soft, barely a whisper. “Let’s go home,” and then Ji punctuates the sentence, which is breathy and laced with need, with a dainty little belch, barely there as it spills out of Guang Hong’s mouth.

* * *

“Leo,” Guang Hong exclaims as he writhes around on the dull gray carpet on Leo’s dorm room floor. “Help me.”

Leo’s hand flutters to his mouth and covers his face in shock. Keeps his jaw from falling open and hitting the floor.

Because the burp in his face was a swift reminder that Guang Hong was drunk, and a drunk Ji meant that nothing would go on between them. No matter how badly he wanted to keep touching Ji’s smooth skin and kiss every freckle he could find, Ji didn’t drink. Ever.

He had been waiting all week to get to a point where they could actually have _time_ , could take things slow, and not worry about Ji’s roommate or going to class, or getting enough sleep-in order to be up for 6:30 off ice training. Now they had to wait even longer.

When he comes back from the bathroom to find Ji writhing around on the carpet in an over sized pajama shirt and his underwear, and nothing else, it makes it difficult to be responsible.

“C’mon dude, let’s go to bed.” Leo stuffs Guang Hong’s right arm into the pajama shirt. Ji goes limp under his touch and lets him manipulate his body accordingly. When the shirt is on, Leo extends his hand to help Ji off the floor.

“Oh, Leo,” Ji’s voice is far smoother than it should be. “I like that idea,” followed by more giggles. Leo extends his hand, and pulls a very boneless Ji up from where he stands. Ji’s body is impossibly warm and impossibly soft against him. Leo wraps a firm arm around Ji’s waist, just to keep him from pulling them both back down onto the carpet.

Carefully, he moves Ji over to the bed, but has to pry his fingers away from his waistline. “Ji, come on.”

“What do you mean?” Ji’s smile is large, open mouthed, and different from the subtle smiles that he usually gives.

“You need to drink some water first,” Leo slides open his closet and locates a clean cup. He pours Ji a glass of water from the pitcher he keeps in his fridge.  

“Ah, Leo is so thoughtful when he is thoughtful,” Guang Hong accepts the plastic cup and drinks most of the liquid. “We’re not,” he takes another long draught, “gonna fool around tonight are we?”

Now it’s Leo’s turn to laugh. “I don’t think so.”

“Ugh,” Guang Hong throws himself back on the bed, and Leo barely has time to grab the glass of water from him before he spills it all over the covers. “I knew it.”

“Knew what?” Leo turns the light off and climbs into the impossibly small mattress alongside Guang Hong. Ji lets him move his body so that they’re slotted against one another on their sides and facing. Leo’s hand rests on Ji’s hip. He tries not to stroke the soft bare swath of skin between his shirt and his underwear. “Does this have to do with boats?” He asks recalling the strange analogy from before.

“Maybe.” And although he can’t see Ji’s face in the darkness. He can feel him screwing up his face so that his expression is pinched tight. “You do like me right Leo?”

“Of course Ji,” Leo pulls Guang Hong close. In the darkness, he fumbles for the other boy, grabbing his shoulder and then finding his face and kissing him softly. “I don’t want to take advantage of you when you’re drunk though.”

Although most wouldn’t know it, Leo can tell when his friend’s behavior is off.

“Oh,” Guang Hong says it like he’s just now realized that he’s drunk. Or that he’s drunk, and it’s not a good idea to fool around when you’re drunk. “Can we kiss each other again?”

Leo doesn’t answer, just slots his mouth against Guang Hong’s and hopes that he doesn’t get burped on again. Guang Hong is especially sexy when he’s trying not to be.  On those rare times that he _tries_ it backfires horribly.

“So you’re not jiǎo tà liǎng zhī chuán?”

“I don’t even know what that means Ji,” Leo admits with a chuckle. He can’t help himself. The allure of bare skin is too much. He rubs slow soft circles into Ji’s exposed hip.

“Foot in two boats,” Ji murmurs into his shoulder. Leo can feel his breath hot and damp, and it makes making the right decisions difficult. “Seeing someone else.”

“Ji,” Leo tries to take this seriously. Hide the exasperation in his voice. He tightens his grip on Guang Hong’s hip and pushes him away, so that they’d be looking at each other intently if the room weren’t so pitch black. “You spend the night here a few nights a week. We eat lunch and dinner together every day. We have practice together. Off ice in the morning, and on ice in the afternoon. When would I have time to see anyone else?”

“Oh,” Ji repeats it again as if the thought had just occurred to him. “Makes sense.”

Leo can tell that there’s more there, more feelings that underlie Guang Hong’s insecurity, but it’s unlikely that they’ll be articulated tonight. Once Leo said that fooling around was off the table, Guang Hong’s voice immediately slipped into that lazy half asleep tone that signifies that his eyes are drooping and he’s seconds away from being out cold.

“We can talk about it more in the morning. We can fool around in the morning. I like you.”

  
“I like you too Leo.”

“I know silly. I know.”


	4. Chapter 4

Guang Hong must be dead. That’s the only reasonable explanation for all of this. He wakes up the next morning, not only in Leo’s bed, but also with Leo mouthing hot wet little kiss bites onto his neck. He’s died and gone to heaven, and that’s _why_ he feels Leo half hard and grinding into his backside.

 

Gracie poisoned him with something blue and flavored like candy, and that’s why he’s dead. It’s kind of an alright way to go.

 

“Leo,” Guang Hong’s eyes flutter open and then back closed again in protest. In his sleep addled state his body and his mind fight for dominance. On one hand he feels warm and safe, and would very much like to go back to sleep. On the other hand, he feels sweat on his back from where Leo was slotted against him for hours during the night. The way Leo ruts against him and kisses him pulls him to attention so that he’s aching and hard and hasn’t even done anything.  

 

“M’ I dreaming?” Guang Hong asks sleepily. Slowly he rolls over and presses his body back into Leo’s.

 

“No, baby.” Leo’s voice is thick and syrupy like the blue drink in the clear glass bottle. His breath puffs hot against his kiss damp skin, and it sends chills down his spine.

 

Guang Hong opens his eyes slowly, turns over on the mattress, and locks his gaze with Leo’s half lidded one. Leo must have snuck off and showered at some point when they got back to the dorm, either last night or this morning. He smells like soap and detergent from his pajamas.

 

Guang Hong is fairly certain that he still smells like grass and camp fire. His mouth feels thick and filmy like he desperately needs to brush his teeth. However, the allure of this rare version of Leo is overpowering. He’s alone with Leo. Leo wants him now, and he’s sober and Guang Hong wants him back. Wants him more badly than ever before because there are weeks, if not months of tension that hangs thickly between them. Tension that’s piqued and rekindled when they kiss, heightened when he spends the night in Leo’s cramped bed, but never fully extinguished.

 

“Only you still want to,” Leo’s half smile melts into a wide eyed frown. It’s an expression that second guesses, and assumes that he’s made a mistake. It’s strange, to see Leo’s natural and bubbly confidence.

 

“I do,” Guang Hong rocks his hips against Leo’s. Both of them gasp into one another when their clothed erections brush against one another. Leo’s hand flutters to Guang Hong’s back side and squeeze him tight. For a moment, all they do is rock against one another. The pressure is tempting, but the clothed damp feeling between them reminds him that this only a hint of what is to come.  

 

Guang Hong leans in to kiss Leo. It’s breathy and open mouthed with just the slightest push of tongue. His mouth is dry, and he knows that he probably tastes awful, but Leo kisses him back all the same.

 

When he pulls back, Leo looks up at him. His eyes are fully open this time. Guang Hong can see a question there. It pulls at the corners of his mouth and makes him open his mouth as if he wants to speak, but can’t find the words.

Guang Hong has a question too. It is a question that rings in the back of his head and feels left over from last night. If it wasn’t someone else, and Leo liked him, then what was the problem?

 

Didn’t Leo say that if he found someone he’d love them completely?

  


“But um, Leo?” Guang Hong wets his dry campfire chapped lips with his tongue. He shifts up so that he’s sitting up, halfway laying over Leo. Leo teases him for his hot pink bed spread and sheets, but Leo’s the one with a comforter and sheets that are dark gray with soft pink colored roses all over them. Leo looks good, looks comfortable pressed against the sheets and wrapped up in the blankets.

“Let me-,” and hopes that his voice doesn’t crack.

It would be so easy to just let Leo guide him through all of this, but Leo directs so much of their relationship. When they hold hands in public, and when they kiss, and Guang Hong has to be invited to spend the night in Leo’s room. Obviously, Leo wouldn’t want to spend the night with him when Michael is in the room.

They can figure out all the rest of it later. Right now, they both want this.

“Okay,” Leo looks at him confidently. Like there’s no question that he trusts Guang Hong, and whatever it is that they’re about to do.

Guang Hong scrambles for his shirt, and pulls it up over the back of his shoulders, and discards it to the floor. “Yours too.” He pushes his hands up under Leo’s shirt and lets his hands rest flat on Leo’s chest. Guang Hong tries to savor the feeling of downy soft body hair and tight compact muscle.

“Do you like what you see?” Leo teases in a voice that’s soft, and airy, and a stark mismatch to the heavy lust filled expression in his eyes.  

He loops each of his index fingers around the elastic of Leo’s boxers. They’re a soft shade of orange peach with a thin white waistband, and they clash so beautifully with the pink and the gray of the sheets. “Yeah, I do Leo.”

Guang Hong pulls them down inch by inch and watches the white waistband sink lower, and smooth tan skin replace it. He’s always known that Leo was beautiful. That’s easy to see in his kind expression, and the way that he moves on the ice, and the way that he dresses in neon and pastel and looks trendy and elegant all at once.

But this is entirely new. Moves far beyond their flustered, rushed movements just after worlds, and kissing before bed.

Guang Hong lets his hands float over chenille skin. Leo’s stomach is flat, and there’s the budding hint of definition there. Like he’s one or two seasons away from his body changing and becoming tighter, and more muscular.

“You’re making me blush, Ji.”

“You _always_ make me blush Leo. How does it feel?”

It’s like every shameful wet dream he’s ever had has come true. Leo’s hard, and needy, and below him. Guang Hong lets a hand flutter to Leo’s hip. With his other hand, he experimentally traces Leo with a single digit, from the base to his tip. With the pad of his thumb he spreads the small drops of pre-come across the head.

Leo’s slightly bigger than he is. Longer, and definitely thicker in a way that makes his eyes go wide, and his mouth water with uncertainty and need. 

“Ji,” the way Leo says it, it comes out in short pained bursts. Makes it sounds like his nickname has several syllables, and not just two simple letters. “It feels really good,” Leo admits.

Guang Hong responds in kind with another slow, experimental flick of his wrist up Leo’s length. Then, Guang Hong tries to remember what it is that he likes best.

Slowly, like he’s back at home and trying not to wake anyone with his furtive movements, he licks the palm of his hand and moves grips Leo a bit more firmly than before. With rapt fascination he watches Leo’s foreskin move up and down over the head.

“Ji, that feels so good.” Leo’s determined to wrestle all the control back from him, and steal his confidence too. “Ji, you look so pretty. I wanna kiss every single freckle.” “Ji,” His name is repeated over and over again in a breathy kind of tone that Guang Hong didn’t know that his relaxed friend was capable of uttering. “Ji, how do you know what I like?”

“I’m just doing what I like,” Guang Hong confesses.

“Can I kiss you?”

Guang Hong leans forward, but doesn’t let go of Leo. Leo wraps his legs around Guang Hong’s middle, and grinds against him. It’s then that Guang Hong becomes acutely aware of the fact that he’s still wearing his underwear, and he’s very hard.

Leo’s kiss is fiery, fast and needy in a way that they haven’t kissed before. There’s a speed and an urgency there that he never considered Leo capable of.

“Ji, let me touch you back.”

“Not yet.” Leo leave him breathless without even trying. The prospect of the tables being turned, is too addictive for Guang Hong, who knows that all of this is fleeting. All it would take is a gentle push on the shoulder and their positions would be switched. Guang Hong would give in and become lost to the feeling of Leo leading the way immediately and love every second. The problem is, he loves every second of this too. “Leo, I wanna make you feel good.”

“You are,” nails rake against his skin and struggle for purchase as Leo struggles against him, tries to pulls his underwear down and fails to get it down far enough to get access to his cock.

“Leo,” Guang Hong stills the movements of his hand. He lets his other hand rest heavily on Leo’s chest. The seconds hang in the air between them as he watches his hand rise and fall against Leo’s chest. “This is important to me. Please,” although he doesn’t exactly know what he’s asking. “Let me do this,” or “let me make you come,” or “let me show you that I’m worth it.” All the questions swirl in his mind, and the tension hangs in the way that he looks at Leo, hungrily, how he bites his lip, and wonders if Leo will listen.

“Ji,” Leo’s eyes go lidded and heavy again. Like he’s hearing him for the first time. “Gonna take care of me Ji?”

“Yeah,” but it’s hard to stay confidant when Leo can take him apart with just a simple question. Guang Hong searches his mind and tries to think of other things that he likes. He allows his palm, the one that rested heavily on Leo’s chest, to trail downward to join his other hand. He cups each of Leo’s balls carefully. Notices how smooth the skin is there. Notices how he’s drawn tight. “Of course.” Guang Hong knows that whenever that happens to him he’s about to come.

“C’mon Leo,” Guang Hong teases. He rubs against his partner’s perineum with the pads of his fingers. That was always good; that always made him come really quickly. Not as quickly as a few fingers, but he didn’t know if Leo was ready for that or not. “Come for me. Please?”

“Ji,” Leo whines. Guang Hong almost doesn’t want it to end. The confidence he’s worked up is intoxicating. The sight of Leo with his eyes screwed shut, fisting his pink and gray sheets, and his chest raised up off the bed slightly is addictive. He wants to take a picture of it.

Would Leo let him do that?

If he promised to never show it to anyone ever? Would he let him?

“Ji I’m going to.”

“Leo,” Guang Hong’s voice is thick and sweet and blissful. Leo twists and grinds, and lifts his hips up off the bed. Then, he’s coming across the dark brown hair on his stomach, and the smooth skin of his chest, and on Guang Hong’s hand.

Guang Hong has always wondered. Has seen it in videos. Has heard Phichit complain about the taste. But something that looks so good couldn’t taste bad right? And the sight of Leo’s cock did make his mouth water. And he would’ve leaned down for a taste if he had any more confidence. This could work as a substitute? Right?

Guang Hong’s leans downward and licks a long stripe from the base of Leo’s cock up to his belly button.

“Ji, oh my god.”

“What Leo?” Guang Hong looks up at him through his bangs. Leo brushes them back away from his face.

Guang Hong laps at his hand too. The taste is bitter, but not unpleasant. If anything the reaction he’s getting from Leo makes it all worth it.

So he laps another stripe in the perfect little v of Leo’s hips. “It’s kind of good.” It’s not exactly the truth, but he can be sexy too. He can be sexy for Leo.

“You’re evil Ji.” Leo rubs his forehead with his free hand, and then let’s Guang Hong’s bangs fall to the side. “I didn’t know you could be so evil.”

“I think that’s uhm,” Guang Hong can feel his confidence fade as he laps up the last drops of come on Leo’s stomach. Whatever was there between them before, the power and the need has dried up. Now Guang Hong is the one that’s hard and straining and needy. “What you deserved. For making me wait.”

“Probably,” Leo chuckles and cups Guang Hong’s chin. The gesture beckons him to move up Leo’s body. Leo pulls him down into a deep kiss. It’s not as fast paced or needy as before, but it still manages to remind him that he’s very hard, and very ready for whatever it is that Leo wants to give him. Leo grinds a flat palm against his clothed erection.

Guang Hong can only describe it as something between torture and the best thing that’s ever happened to him.

“Tell me Ji,” Leo sucks at the lobe of his ears for a moment, and it makes Guang Hong gasp. Makes him grind down desperately against Leo’s thigh. “Do you like fingers?”

“Inside?”

“Hm.” Leo nods through lidded eyes.

“Love them.” He says with a blush. But it’s the truth. He really loves it.

“Why don’t you get the lube that’s on the desk?” Leo gestures to the other side of the room, just a few feet away. “And then get back on top?”

“Lazy,” Guang Hong teases.

“You wanted to be in charge right?” Leo argues with a raised brow. “You can be on top. I’ll make you feel really good, Ji. I promise.”

Now it’s Guang Hong’s turn to gasp Leo’s name, needy and trembling, “Leo.”

With shaky legs he rises from the bed, finds the pump bottle, and puts it directly behind Leo on the mini fridge. Then, he straddles Leo once again.

“Up here.” Leo taps at his hip a few times as if he’s gesturing for him to move up. 

“Ah, Leo?”

“Trust me. It feels really good.”

* * *

Leo watches Guang Hong move up his body. He settles his knees on either side of Leo’s head, and all but sits on his chest.  It was amazing to him, just how sexy Guang Hong could be without really trying. How his confidence came and went like the ebb and the flow within a song, or a dance routine. It was kind of amazing, how he could fill in those little gaps and keep things going when Guang Hong’s confidence failed.

Leo knows that he’s been indirect and unclear with his feelings and his intentions towards his fellow skater. It’s incredibly difficult, when there’s so much pressure. The grand prix events, and national, and four continents, and worlds not to mention they have to start thinking about Pyeong Chang right now.

Guang Hong’s quads keep getting cleaner, and he struggles to maximize the single quad that he’s incorporated into his program.

It’s hard to think about everything that they need to accomplish this year, and think about how very much he’d like to be Guang Hong’s everything. He’d love to wake up tangled together underneath his comforter for forever, but it just doesn’t seem feasible.

He knows how hyper focused that skaters get during the season. He’s seen his rink mates have relationships that begin just after worlds, and crumble by the time nationals rolls around. Miranda has the timing of her relationships down to a near science, so that she breaks up just after the GPF, and has the holiday season to recover.

It has been difficult, up to this point, to let Ji know how he truly feels with his words and his actions. He hopes that making him feel as good as possible will suffice.

He moves Ji slightly so that he’s kneeling on either side of his head. Ji’s legs rest against his shoulders, and he’s constantly shooting him furtive, “are you sure this is okay?” glances.

Yes, it’s lazy, Ji isn’t wrong at all. But it’s a great view really. From here he can see how Ji is so hard and so needy, he looks red and rubbed raw. He can look up the expanse of his skin and count endless freckles across his hip and his stomach and his chest.

When they’re more experienced with one another, and Ji’s more comfortable with letting him explore, he will try his hardest to kiss every single one.

but he also understand Guang Hong’s need to feel like he’s in control. He’s spent his entire career, since his senior debut being underestimated by people that were more experienced, and gave more traditionally masculine performances. If Ji wanted to be on top, that was more than okay.

“Wanna watch you start with your fingers,” Leo playfully lets his hands slide over Ji’s length, but he never quite grabs him completely.

“Leo,” his voice is a whine. He’s needy, and he really should _not_ tease. It’s hard not to when he’s got Ji naked and flushed on top of him like this.

Leo leans back and pours a bit of the viscous clear lube onto his hand, he takes Guang Hong’s hand into his own and smooths the liquid over his fingers. “There, now you get started. Then I’ll get started. I’ll be fun Ji.”

To reiterate his point, Leo pulls Ji forward by the hips. Slowly, he starts to take Guang Hong into his mouth. First, he laps lightly at the tip and takes special care to look up at Ji. He watches the way his eyes roll back and his lids flutter closed. Then, he opens his mouth a bit wider and lets the tip rest across his lips. He tongues at Ji softly, teasing the slit and lapping up every bit of pre-come he can coax from his partner.

This particular method of payback pales in comparison to Ji’s earlier treatment, but it will serve it’s purpose. He can already feel Ji’s knees grow weak and his hips shake in his grasp.

“Leo,” he can feel Ji move against him. Sees his hand disappear behind his back, and watches his eyes dilate wide. “Feels really good.”

Leo pulls off with an obscene popping noise, just for Ji. “Looks really good,” he says with a laugh. But he doesn’t waste time. Immediately he grabs Ji at the base of his cock and puts him back into his mouth. He doesn’t tease this time, he sinks lower and lower and lower, until he’s almost gagging on Ji’s cock. The position makes him seem so much bigger, makes his lithe form seem so much more powerful.

Leo works against him, bobs and sucks and bobs and sucks in a way that he can only hope that Ji likes.

Little noises that he wants to record and listen to forever spill out of Ji’s mouth. Gasps and half sobs that make him twitch and get hard all over again. Unbridled gasps of his name that he never thought Ji, who was so reserved, was capable of giving.

Reluctantly, Leo lets a hand leave Ji’s hip and cups his ass.   Immediately Leo admonishes himself for not doing this before. Ji’s soft and muscular all over, and here is absolutely no exception. Leo grabs and squeezes to the point that it’s hard to keep sucking and bobbing as he’d initially planned when he really just wants to squeeze and toy with the pliant flesh.

“Leo,” Guang Hong says with a stern voice. A voice that silently says, “keep sucking.”

“Sorry, Ji.” Leo whispers into his skin. “You’re just so soft. And you know, you won’t let me kiss _al_ _l_ of your freckles.” Leo keeps squeezing unapologetically, but he also knows how when he needs to rectify the situation. He leans forward and takes Ji back into his mouth. He drinks him down deep, and doesn’t give him a chance to think much about the firm hands kneading at his backside due to the way that he works his tongue, and his throat and laps at him just so.

“Oh, wow, Leo?” His voice comes out in a jilted stutter. But the question asks in fewer words and syllables, “is that, are you?”

The answer is yes.

Carefully, slowly, he traced Ji’s rim and worked his index finger inside along Ji’s own. His finger slides in with minimal resistance, but the fit is impossibly tight. It makes him wonder if at some point in the future Ji will love him enough and trust him enough to let him go further.

Leo works his finger in time with his mouth and his tongue. He knows that the movements are awkward, doesn’t care because Ji makes the best breathy little moans. He says his name like it’s a prayer, “Leo, Leo, Leo,” as if everything begins and everything ends with him.

As if this is the first time Ji’s ever let anyone do this to him.

Leo had considered it, that this was Ji’s first time. But the gravity of it all wasn’t clear until he heard his name on Ji’s tongue so desperate and so earnest. There was a distinct possibility that Ji wants everything he does. He must right? In order to let Leo be the first?

When Ji comes, Leo can feel his toes clench against his sides. His cock twitches in Leo’s mouth, and Leo simply sucks harder, moves his mouth against Ji harder, makes sure that he gets every single drop and makes Ji feel the very best that he can.

His mouth feels sticky and thick with Ji’s come. Then, it felt warm and thick with Ji’s tongue. Ji was leaning into him again, still awkwardly perched over his chest and kissing him relentlessly all the same.

Leo’s eyes go wide while Ji kisses him. He can’t swallow fast enough, and it feels like Ji’s chasing it. Chasing his own come in his mouth.

“It’s still kind of good, Leo.” Ji pulls back and licks his lips.

Leo swallows thickly. Slowly, as if time stands still, he pulls his finger out of Ji.

“I mean,” Ji’s gaze droops low, so that it’s heavily lidded and almost closed. “I like it.”

“Good god Ji,” Leo breathes.

“What?” But Ji only giggles. Like he knows exactly what it is and what he’s done.

When Ji’s lips meet his their tongues are sticky and heavy with the taste of Guang Hong’s come. Leo would very much like to deny that it affects him. Would like to think that it doesn’t make his cock go half hard again.

“I can’t believe you let me kiss you.” Guang Hong leans back on his haunches, and then moves so that he’s no longer straddling Leo. The closeness and the warmth and the contact is immediately missed.

“It was already in my mouth Ji.” Leo admits with a tinge of annoyance in his voice.

“Ah, but,” Guang Hong’s complexion shifts from pink, to red, to near purple. “It is kind of dirty, isn’t it?”

“I thought that’s why you did it? To impress me?” Leo lazily plays with Guang Hong’s nipples. He pinches them until their red and over stimulated and hard. He’s not going to let Guang Hong tease him like this, and get away with it. Not when he’s already getting hard again.

“Ah, Leo. Do you want to take a shower?”

“Yeah,” Leo agrees. “You smell like grass and campfire,” he says with a grin.  

“Leo!”

“And morning breath.”

Guang Hong responds with a playfully light slap to his shoulder. He deserves it.

“Just a little.”

“Can I borrow some clothes?” Leo already has a tooth brush in his room. Leo pulled him one from the four pack he picked up at the start of the semester a few weeks ago. It was easier than Guang Hong running back up stairs when they’d already settled in to go to bed. “There’s no reason for me to just run upstairs when…” He gestures to Leo’s crotch. Still hard. Possibly getting harder at the thought of sneaking into the communal showers together.

“Alright,” Leo moves to his closet. Let’s his cock bob and sway as he moves, and hopes that it looks half as sexy as he thinks it does.

He pulls a few shirts, and a few pairs of leggings from his closet along with a few towels.

“You owe me quarters though,” Leo says in the most no-nonsense kind of tone that he can muster when he’s naked and Guang Hong is naked, and they’ve just fooled around and are negotiating a shower together. “So I can wash all of this laundry later.”

“Yeah, fine.” Guang Hong is flicking through his phone absent mindedly, but Leo can see the way his skin has stayed flushed red and the way his pupils have stayed blown wide. “Do you,” His breath hitches, but his gaze never breaks from his phone. Like it’s the only thing keeping his resolve intact. “have condoms Leo?”

“Yeah,” he breathes.

“Bring those too.”


	5. Chapter 5

Leo led him down the hallway to the shower. Their palms were sweaty and they slipped against each other as they walked. Leo was wrapped up in his soft teal robe. Guang Hong shimmied back into his pajama shirt, as well as the oversized boxers that belonged to Leo.

When they crossed paths with Leo’s floor mates walking to the bathroom, Leo didn’t let go of his hand. He only squeezed it tighter. However, the girl they crossed paths with was wearing last night’s mini skirt and a large over sized sweater that clearly didn’t belong to her. Her heels were tucked up under her arm. She avoided eye contact with them as if it was obvious what she did last night, and that somehow negated the obviousness of what they were about to do.

Leo’s hand was damp and clammy against his own. It made his chest tight, but not exactly in a good way. It wasn’t that he didn’t want this. He did want it, so very badly. It’s just very clear that Leo knows what he’s doing, and Guang Hong very much does not. It makes him feel like Leo’s wrung out every bit of confidence he had. Despite all of this, he feels motivated to keep going, keep pushing, keep up with Leo.

He knows that Leo doesn’t care that his confidence is razor thin. He knows that Leo wants this, but he can’t help but feel that the moment is fleeting. That when all of this is over, Leo won’t hold onto his hand in the hallway. But for a moment all of that is overridden by the fact that knows that Leo is going to make him feel good, and maybe just maybe he can succeed in doing the same for Leo. Earlier was proof enough of that. He could let Leo guide him through this, and get by on the knowledge he had of his own body. He could discover what Leo liked as they went along.  
At least that’s what he tells himself, until Leo guides him into the large handicap accessible shower.

“I’m your first, right Ji?” He asks as he fiddles with the faucet, and adjusts the water so that it’s steamy hot.

“Yeah,” Guang Hong supplies. “That’s right.”

“So um,” Leo threads his hands through his hair as he struggles for the right words to say. “You’re sure?”

Guang Hong openly rolls his eyes. He was expecting Leo to say something about how they needed to be quiet. It was eight A.M. Saturday, and nobody on the floor would be up until ten or eleven anyway. However, it was still public and they still needed to contain themselves. He expected Leo to warn him, that even with their fingers, and the lube, and the condoms, it might still hurt a little bit.

Of course he’s sure.

He wouldn’t expend all of this effort and all of this energy if he weren’t. “Of course I want this Leo. I want you.” His words come out with a slight stutter. He’s had it for as long as he can remember, and he’s tried for years to hide.  
He’d hoped that the shaky syllables wouldn’t pop out when he’s about to lose his virginity to the person he’s been dreaming of for years now. It’s not a proper confession, but its the closest he’s probably going to get any time in the near future because Leo’s kissing him again and it’s hard to think about things when Leo does that thing with his mouth. He’ll take Guang Hong’s bottom lip between his and applies just enough pressure.

“Leo,” Guang Hong playfully swats Leo’s hands away from his hips. “Let me get clean! You were the one complaining.” Guang Hong squeezes a generous amount of lavender body wash onto Leo’s loofah. He really should’ve gone upstairs and grabbed his own things, because for some strange reason the idea of tasting his own come on Leo’s mouth isn’t appauling at all, but the idea of sharing the same loofah is too personal, almost disgusting.

“Here, let me.” Leo murmurs into the juncture of his shoulder and his neck. The steam is abundant. It fills his eyes, and his mouth, and his nose and makes everything seem thick and exaggerated in the spray.

Guang Hong hands Leo the loofah and lets him wash him off. The feeling of the sponge against his skin is rough and overwhelming. His skin is overstimulated already, and so every touch feels like it’s pushing him to the precipice of arousal or mild annoyance, as if his body cannot decide if he wants to tell Leo stop or to simply let him continue.

He settles for a series of weak little mewls that slip out of the corner of his mouth when Leo softly touches his nipples with the sponge. Who knew that this often ignored part of his body could be so responsive? Who knew that Leo would like this part of him so much?

“Ji,” Leo whispers into his ear. It sends a shiver down his spine, and causes him to arch his back into Leo. Leo isn’t completely hard yet, but he’s certainly aroused. Guang Hong can feel it pressed against the cleft of his ass, and so he ruts up against it. “Babe, you need to remember to be quiet.”

“Oh!” Guang Hong responds a bit too loudly given Leo’s reminder. However, there was something that was so natural, and so good about what they were doing. It felt as if he didn’t even need to remind himself to stay confident. “Sorry,” he lowers his voice to a whisper, and concentrates his gaze on the corroded metal fixtures of the tap. They’re gray and rusted with thick bits of calcium deposits in between.

“It’s okay,” Leo gathers a large handful of soap suds onto his hand and passes the sponge to his other hand. “Hold this Ji.”

Guang Hong complies.

Leo wraps his hand around his cock. Leo’s strokes are firm and demand that Guang Hong grow increasingly harder with each thrust. Guang Hong can feel himself twitch and harden in Leo’s grasp. Leo’s hand feels so much better than his own, but so natural. It is as if his body had been ready for this for a long time. In reality, it had. “Ji, it feels so good getting you hard like this.”

Guang Hong feels the plum colored blush burn down his chest before he sees it. There’s steam from the shower, and he’s pretty sure his skin is colored red from the water any way, but Leo pushes a new heat into his body.

Leo’s hands leave his cock, and Guang Hong bites his lip in order to stifle the whine that dares to slip out of his mouth.

“You’re teasing me.”

“You wanted to get clean.” But Leo’s actions betray his words. He washes Guang Hong’s back quickly. His soap covered hands part Guang Hong’s cheeks. He can feel the soft pressure of a single digit against his hole, alongside the flush of embarassment that comes along with knowing that Leo is looking at him there. Guang Hong’s legs tremble with excitement.

“Do you think it will just slide in?” Leo asks.Leo’s rubbing himself against the cleft of Guang Hong’s ass again.

Guang Hong feels his stomach drop slightly. It’s the same kind of feeling he gets in the split seconds between gliding out to the middle of the rink, and when the music begins to play. The same kind of feeling he got before he gave a presentation in school. Uncertainty tugs at his gut and threatens to ruin the moment. He’d never used more than a few fingers on himself before, and Leo seemed so much bigger.

But Leo did know what he was doing. “We can try?”

“We’ll use lots of lube.”

Leo makes them stand out of the spray. It’s a little bit cold, but the idea of getting out of the shower now, drying off, putting on clothes, only to take them off, well it sounds more daunting than the idea of taking Leo’s cock

“I mean I really should get some better lube. One that would work better in the shower.”

Guang Hong didn’t even have lube. He usually used whatever was available when he fingered himself. Lotion, or body soap, or baby oil, all things that worked in the moment but weren’t exactly what the situation required.

Guang Hong splays his hands out across the salmon colored tiles along the wall. The grout in between is a tan color that looks dirty despite the fact that it’s supposed to look that shade. He can feel the crinkle of the discarded foil wrapper against the bottom of his foot as he moves his weight from one foot to the other waiting for Leo. “Leo, hurry up. Before I get cold and you have to warm me up.”

“Ji, if you keep saying things like that, we won’t get very far at all.” Leo’s words are accompanied by a hot breath against his neck, the feeling of more lube against his hole, and the feeling of firm hands on his hips. “Ready?”

“Yeah.”

The next thing Guang Hong feels is pressure. His body feels tight, like a resistance banned pulled to taught and about to snap. It’s paired with a dull ache, like the kind that he feels in his feet after a long session on the ice, or in his muscles after a long day of training. “Oh!” Guang Hong can’t hold in the sharp noise that escapes from his mouth. Leo’s cock is too much too soon, and the feeling is overwhelming.

“Should I stop?” Guang Hong can feel Leo grab himself at the base and begin to pull out, but that somehow intensifies the feeling of tightness and pressure.

“No!” Guang Hong exhales sharply. “Give me a minute Leo.”

“Here,” Leo presses down on his hips softly. “Stand flat on your feet. Relax. Arch your back instead.”

Guang Hong complies and rests his feet flat on the tiles. There’s a good quarter inch or so of water that lingers on the shower floor. For a moment all they do is listen to the sound of the water splatter against the floor. He inhales and feels the steam from the shower thick in his mouth. Guang Hong then closes his eyes and breathes deeply, in and out the way Zhao taught him to do when he ends the free skate and he’s absolutely exhausted. He feels the warm steam against his left side, and the cool air from the other side where there is no water to warm them. The contrasting feeling gives him goosebumps and makes him shiver into Leo. Of course, this only pushes Leo’s cock deeper inside. “Tiramisu,” Guang Hong murmurs under his breath.

Leo chuckles in his ear, and even that makes it feel like it’s pushed deeper. Like Leo’s twitching within him.

“It’s not funny Leo,” and as much as Guang Hong wants to continue, it’s difficult to hide the frustration in his voice. There’s the hint and the burn and the promise of something amazing there. He knows this from all the times he’s used his fingers. He can feel it now with the way Leo twitches, but it seems so far off.

“Sorry, it’s just,” Leo’s hands flutter from his hips up his sides in a long luxurious stroke. It makes his heart flutter. Like they’ve just started out, and Leo’s cock isn’t buried inside of him. “You’re allowed to swear, if you want to.” His hands go back to his nipples. Leo really likes doing that. Playing with them until they’re tender and overstimulated. “But when you say things like that, it’s just,”

“Don’t say it.” Guang Hong can handle it once or twice, but anything else was just asking for trouble. Leo was already on thin ice with the whole, “oh, maybe I can just slide it in,” line.

“Okay then I won’t say that you’re cute.” Leo’s hands drift back down his body. One of Leo’s hands returns to his hip, and the other to his cock. “Instead I’ll say that I want you hard again.” Leo is true to his word. He works his cock with long firm strokes that have him back at full attention again in no time. “I’ll say that you look so sexy, Ji. I’ll say that I’m sorry that I put it in too fast. Cause I want this to be good for you.”

“You can’t just say things like that Leo,” but Guang Hong cannot deny that the pain has faded to a dull ache. In his wake, Leo set his skin aflame, and all he can do is burn, and wait for Leo to move. “Stop talking. Show me.” As if to accent his point, he pushes back against Leo’s cock, impossibly hard and twitching within.

“Ji,” Leo’s voice is a deep slur. He sounds like he drank too much mysterious blue stuff; he sounds drunk. Leo’s thrusts are deep and erratic. They touch Guang Hong in just the right spot, but before he can really be consumed by the slow torturous burn of Leo’s body, Leo’s cursing in his ear, “Damn.” Followed by deep breaths against his hear. “Ji, I’m sorry.”

“Already Leo?” Guang Hong’s voice is playful, but he’s honestly surprised. Leo’s so confident and knowledgeable. He just assumed that he’d last a little bit longer.

“You’re just too sexy, Ji.” Leo pulls out slowly, and discards the condom. Then, Leo grabs him by the base of his cock and gives him more of those firm delicious strokes that somehow feel infinitely better than his own hand.

“Leo,” Guang Hong whines, mewls and struggles against Leo’s hand wanting more, more, and more.

“Ji, baby,” Leo’s other hand, the one that’s not wrapped around his cock and causing his undoing, presses lightly against his mouth. “You need to be quiet remember? Someone could come in.” Leo’s voice is barely above a whisper.

Guang Hong mouths against Leo’s hands. In no time at all he can feel the tight wonderful heat build again in his stomach and at the base of his spine. Of course he cannot help but wonder how it would feel if all of this were happening while he had Leo’s cock, but Guang Hong can only assume they’ll have other chances to try.

He comes into Leo’s hand, and feels his knees buckle at the same time. Leo steadies him with strong hands and a smiling mouth pressed against his cheek.

After they dry off and redress, it’s impossible to ignore the line of three or four men from Leo’s floor waiting outside the bathroom. Among them is Leo’s neighbor Mark, and the swimmer that sits in the row behind him in finite mathematics. When they emerge from the shared bathroom, Mark erupts into mocking applause.

“It’s about fucking time Iglesia.”

Forget blushing, or aggressively blushing so hard that it feels like you might break a blood vessel. Guang Hong wants to melt into the floor and die, because this is a whole new level of embarrassment.

“Whatever,” one of the other boys stretches languidly. Guang Hong watches his arms rise up over his head, and his shirt creep up his skin exposing his stomach. “He said he wasn’t going to pull shit like this again this year.”

“Yeah, you do have a single this year,” Mark chines. “Un-fucking necessary.”

While Guang Hong is paralyzed by fear, it’s abundantly clear that Leo’s fight or flight responses have kicked in. He grabs him by the wrist and pulls him down the hallway.

* * *

 

“This year,” Guang Hong lifts his head up from Leo’s chest and scrunches his nose at him.

“Hmm?” Leo moves his phone away from his face and locks eyes with Guang Hong.

After they shamefully ran away from the bathroom. They got breakfast from the cafeteria and ate it in Leo’s bed: cereal, fruit, coffee with lots of sugar and cream. Then, they scoured Leo’s room for quarters, then Guang Hong’s room for more coins, and when they finally had enough money lugged three giant baskets of laundry down to the dorm basement.

They’d both been neglecting things in preparation for the Grand Prix series.

Guang Hong preferred to start his laundry, and then go back up into his room and do other things. He always meant to set an alarm so he’d remember to change it over, but he always forgot. Which usually meant that his laundry ended up thrown out on one of the many folding tables down in the basement.

Leo refused to abandon his laundry, and liked to wait for it to finish. How boring.

It was still early enough that no one was doing laundry yet, and the basement was empty. The harsh yellow fluorescent lights flickered, and everything smelled like lemon cleaner. Guang Hong had to admit that if Leo weren’t with him, it would be just a little bit scary.

Together, he and Leo fill up eight of the ten washing machines. They stuff workout clothes, regular clothes, bedding, and towels into the washing machines, and an endless stream of quarters into the slots.

Then, Leo sprawls out on one of the couches. Guang Hong normally wouldn’t sit on them. The nylon almost waterproof upholstery makes his skin crawl. But Leo provides a nice protective layer between him and the cringe inducing texture of the sofa. Guang Hong lays between his legs and sprawls out across Leo so that they lay chest to chest. His skin is warm, and his hoodie smells of the detergent they just poured into all of the machines.

“Mark said you wouldn't do that this year.” Guang Hong explains. “Which means you must’ve done it last year.”

There’s a tense silence between them. Leo rests his phone on the back of the couch. He opens his mouth slightly, but the words don’t come out. As if he doesn’t quite know what to say.

“Leo, I know you’re more experienced than me. It’s not something you have to hide.” He adds quickly, “I don’t think it’s something that you really can hide,” with a snort.

Leo’s jaw drops, indicating that the comment had the desired effect. Guang Hong worries about the future, tries to decode Leo’s behavior, and wonders just who else Leo’s stolen an early morning shower with. But it’s also kind of funny. Watching him try to balance this playboy persona with the romantic person that whispers baby into his ear earnestly, and makes Guang Hong’s the only person on Earth.

“Yeah,” Leo decides finally. “I did have a lot of fun last year.”

“As opposed to this year,” Guang Hong can’t help but tease.

“That’s not what I meant Ji!” Leo’s voice goes from soft and non-plussed to panicked. Guang Hong can’t help but smile into the fabric of Leo’s hoodie. Leo doesn’t get wound up very easily.

“I know,” Guang Hong responds. As funny as it is to see this new side of Leo, one who’s self conscious and unsure, he can’t keep poking and ribbing him. It just seems too cruel. “Who did you have fun with last year Leo?” That’s not ribbing he’s genuinely curious.

“That sounds like a trick question.”

“I won’t get mad Leo.”

“Ji, your theme last year was violence.” Leo sighs into the top of Guang Hong’s hair. The deep breath tickles his scalp and makes his skin tingle. “Well, uh you know that I like really like you right.”

Guang Hong leans up, and turns over so he can look at Leo directly. “I had my suspicions.” It doesn’t negate the fact that he’s blatantly trying to divert his attention elsewhere.

“Okay, so um. Tiffany, from dance class. Her and I...Well we didn’t date exactly, but we went to her sorority formals together last year. We also fooled around a lot.”

Made sense.

“Lots of the girls on the rugby team. Like most of the second years.”

“That’s really obvious Leo.” Guang Hong tries to keep his voice steady, but he can feel the hot creep of a blush start at his chest, and lap upward at his skin. Which is stupid, Leo’s the one with the colorful past, not him. “Even Grace?”

“Uh, yeah once or twice.”

Guang Hong giggles. “Don’t let my roommate find out.”

“Trust me, I don’t plan on letting him know any time soon.” Leo runs his hands down Guang Hong’s back, he rubs lightly at the clothed skin as he talks. “Cause boy’s got it for her so bad.”

“So bad,” Guang Hong agrees.

“A couple of guys too. My psychology tutor from spring semester. There was a guy in my ballet class last year, and uh-”

“What?”

“Well, a random guy. From a party. We used condoms and everything, but I like...I don’t know his name.”

“Leo!” Guang Hong doesn’t exactly like hearing about Leo’s wealth of experience, but it’s not exactly shocking. Leo seems to be on best friend basis with everyone in their skate club, and the entire women’s rugby team. He’s on a first name basis with nearly every student athlete in the dorm. It’s not exactly shocking that Leo leverages his electricity, and his magnetism to attract others even if the attraction is fleeting. “In the shower though?” Guang Hong’s mind goes back to this morning, and Mark’s playful, but almost fed up comment.

“I had a roommate last year.” Leo explained. “So yeah, sometimes really early or really late, I’d sneak girls into the shower.”

“Oh my god.” Guang Hong buries his face into the crook of Leo’s underarm. “I don’t know if that makes it better or worse about what happened this morning.”

A silence envelops the two of them. Guang Hong would find it awkward considering the topic of conversation, but Leo’s still rubbing his back, and Leo’s so warm, and so it’s very difficult to think of anything other than having a lazy Saturday afternoon nap.

“So,” Leo’s hands move up to his hair and rub at his scalp.

When he was younger, the old woman in the apartment downstairs would babysit him. She had a large fat yellow tabby that would flex its claws into your skin whenever you pet it between the ears. Guang Hong very much feels like that cat now.

“Where do we go from here?”

“What do you mean?” Guang Hong replies.

“You wanna be my boyfriend?”

“Maybe.”

“It’s obvious,” Leo teases, using Guang Hong’s previous words against him. “It doesn’t bother you? That I’ve been with other people?”

“Not if you wanna be with me.” Guang Hong’s stomach twists with uncertainty. It makes sense that Leo would have a wider array of experiences than him. He’s much more extraverted, and much more giving with his affections. Guang Hong wants Leo, and already has a hard time sharing. He’ll compromise. He’ll share some, but not all.

And if Leo doesn’t? Guang Hong’s chest tightens just a little bit. It would be so difficult to go back to being friends, and only friends now. It would be almost impossible to go back to having Leo detangle their interlaced fingers, or invite other people out to lunch when it could be just the two of them.

“I didn’t ask right away, cause I thought you’d wanna fool around for a few semesters like I did. Try everything once. Or twice.”

“You still haven’t asked anything Leo.”

“Hard to think of the right words. I’ve never asked anyone before.”

At that Guang Hong snaps up. He’s about to shoot Leo the meanest look he can contort his face into because this is just cruel.

Then to make matters worse, from the elevator there’s the high pitched feminine call of, “Leo, Ji, wanna go to the mall? Emily’s got her sister’s car and-”

Leo jolts upright at the sound. It sounds like one of the girls that Leo’s close with on the rugby team. Maybe Alex. Maybe someone he’s hooked up with before. Guang Hong feels a lightening hot jolt of jealousy shoot down his spine, followed by the rolling queasy wave of guilt. He can’t feel angry at Leo for past behavior, but where does he draw the line between the present and the past when Leo pushes him away?

“We’re kind of in the middle of something here,” Leo says. His voice is calm, but it speaks volume to Guang Hong.

“Oh.” Alex says slowly. “Oh! Right! That’s what Grace meant when she said that Mark said.”

“Alex,” Leo repeats. His voice is firm, and Guang Hong would confuse the firmness there for anger, if he were almost completely certain that Leo is incapable of feeling anything more extreme than mild annoyance.

“Sorry!” Alex doesn’t even call the elevator, and bolts towards the steps just to give them their privacy again.

Guang Hong’s stomach drops again, and he tries to ignore the queasy hot feeling that’s enveloped him. He tries so hard not to read too much into the situation, but Leo’s asked that they have time alone. Leo drags him to parties, and Leo sits with at least ten people at lunch, and Leo gets lost on the way back to his room if the right person has their door open.

Leo takes Guang Hong’s hands into his own. It was much better when he was laying half on top of Leo and only heard the soft tenor of his voice, and didn’t have the dual opportunity to get lost in his eyes, with are laden with so many emotions that it’s almost impossible to just find one. There’s the sparkle and joy that Leo gets when he shares a favorite song. There’s the worry that he gets when the girls get drunk at the dorm and don't text that they’re back home safely. There’s the same kind of heavy and half lidded look that Leo gives whenever they part from a kiss.

“Okay so,” Leo untangles one of his hands from Guang Hong’s and pushes a stray strand of hair away from Guang Hong’s face. “Do wanna only have sex with each other?”

“No,” Guang Hong’s voice is firm.

Leo smiles as if he knows that wouldn’t work. “Wanna go steady?”

“No.”

“Be exclusive?”

“No Leo,” Guang Hong is one hundred percent certain that Leo is toying with him again.

“Quieres ser mi novio?” Leo cocks a single confidant brow, emboldened now by the fact that Guang Hong knows that he’s teasing.

“You know my Spanish is the worst,” It’s true. They’ve gone to Leo’s favorite Taqueria in Lansing, and Leo tried to tell him way to to say to order for himself. It did not go well.

“Wanna be my boyfriend?” Leo squeezes Guang Hong’s hand in his. All of the uncertainty has melted away from his face, and he’s beaming at Guang Hong. It’s not the cocky, showy kind of confidence that he gets in dance class in front of the girls. It’s more of the subdued kind of humble smile that he gets whenever he’s on the podium. The one that’s filled with amazement, and respect, and certainty that his confidence is justified.

Guang Hong has to bite his bottom lip in order to prevent himself from shouting the first thing that comes to mind. Then, as soon as he takes a half second to think about it he responds, “Yes and no.”

Leo’s confident expression falls slightly, and Guang Hong interjects quickly, “I wanna go on a date, just the two of us. Every week, for forever until we decide not to date anymore, or whatever,” Guang Hong can tell that he’s dangerously close to rambling. “And yeah, I wanna only do it with each other, and after awhile, if we still like it we can be boyfriends.” Guang Hong tries not to let his voice stutter. It sounds like an appropriate compromise given Leo’s hesitance and Guang Hong’s lack of experience. And it is basically like being boyfriends, although Guang Hong’s pretty sure that you’re supposed to lose your virginity after you become boyfriends not before.

Although maybe Americans do things differently.

“That sounds really nice actually,” Leo responds. He leans in to kiss Guang Hong lightly on the lips.

“Good,” Guang Hong chirps. “Then you’re taking me to Lansing tonight for dinner. There are supposed to be Chinese restaurants there. I mean real restaraunts, and not whatever it is that we ate the other day.”

Leo’s response is fast, soft, and genuine. “Alright. We can do that Ji.”


End file.
